The might of the smarts
by piranha pk
Summary: Levy always knew that smarts could outmatch brute force, but it looked like she had to prove her point to a certain Mr. tall and handsome. Modern AU


**A/N**

 **Wow, is that a new fanfic?! Yes :D Sorry for the ... very long hiatus :( Sometimes life is a bitc- *cough* *cough* a bit hard and well ... that´s what I´m dealing with and I´m still kind of recovering ... so I hope this will help me to get back on track with writing FFs and drawing new GaLe goodies :)**

 **Well, anyway, this fic is inspired by the arm wrestling scene I saw on tumblr from Disney´s American Legends Short: John Henry**

 **And like always,**

 **Fairy Tail belongs to Hiro Mashima and I´m just a fanfic author, who tries to use his awesome characters to form a, somwhat, good fanfic :P :D**

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It was supposed to be a girls night out which ended out to be a two girls night out, since some of their friend had to deal with their responsibilities, which included looking after their children, work or the last and most common one for all of Levy´s friends, spending time with their boyfriends, or in some cases husbands.

Levy was just glad that her friend Lucy was still ready to go out with her, since her boyfriend was not home.

To disguise the real reason of her having too much time to bore herself to death, which was the lack of a love life and any kind of excitement in her life, she found a new reason which was to celebrate the release of her best friends newest novel. She had, of course, already read the novel before it was printed and sold, since she had the privilege, as a friend of a novelist, to read her manuscripts and give her her experienced opinion for being the biggest bookworm in Magnolia.

Her friends had been trying, and failing, to match her up with random guys, because they thought that it was "not normal" for a 25 year old to STILL be single and having only one long lasting relationship which was with the tons of books, occupying more than half of her apartment, since the library she worked in gave her not enough time to read them. To change this, her friend decided that they would go to a bar called 'Fairy Tail', where her boyfriend Natsu always went with his friends.

"Seriously Lucy, I don´t need a man in my life! I survived all this years alone by myself very well!" Levy groaned, getting already exhausted from this repeating conversation she had with her friend. She put her forehead on her crossed arms over the bar table, letting her blue locks cover her the rest of her face.

"B-but Levy! We just want you to be happy! And what way would be best than having someone to love in your life?!" her friend, Lucy, said crossing her arms over her large bust, which let Levy´s chest look like a flat board compared to it. That and the fact that her height was rather short compared to her friends and all average women in general, which always made her self-conscious most of the time. How was she even supposed to find a man, in such a place, while every guy was ogling at her busty friend and, most likely, thought of her as the little sister which had to be babysat.

"Can we just enjoy our night together after we didn´t see each other for over two weeks, please?" She said, an exhausted but still happy smile on her face.

Lucy sighed, but smiled back at her and ordered their drinks which took a bit longer than expected with the orange haired, overly flirty barkeeper, who couldn´t stop flirting with her. When their drinks were finally given to them, they took them and went to find a table to sit at and chat.

Lucy found a table in a far corner and maneuvered through the crowd in advance to sit there before anyone else could occupy the place, which left Levy to struggle with her size through all the people on her own. She was wondering why that part was so full of people standing around, when she realized that they were cheering at something, which came out to be a table on which some dudes were arm wrestling. "Man and their need to always show off their strength.. " She mumbled, disapprovingly.

She was about to reach her seat when a guy bumped into her, making her spill some of her drink on her hand and shoes.

"HEY!" She yelled in anger and turned to the guy who was keep walking away as if nothing happened. He turned around at her outburst and she needed a moment to take in his appearance. He was really tall, which was not hard seeing as she was rather short, but he was taller than the average guys she had seen ( safe for the brother of their friend Mirajane and her fiancee, who had, in Levy´s opinion, a size that was definitely not normal and brought pain through her neck when she stood too close to them which made her look far up to meet their gazes.). The first thing she noticed were his numerous piercings which decorated his face. Three over both of his eyes, replacing the missing eyebrows, two on either side of his nose, two under his bottom lip and five on each ear. He even had four on each forearm. The second thing was his unnatural long black, spiky hair which reached his hip. The last thing that fascinated her were his blood red eyes which were gazing into her gold brown ones. He had a deep scowl on his face which eased into an expression of amusement after sizing her body with his eyes, making her feel self conscious again.

"Gihi, what´s a little shrimp like ya doing here?" He asked after approaching her again.

Her first reaction to his nickname was to puff her cheeks out in anger and scowl at him.

Hey, she new she was small, but it didn´t mean that she couldn´t get angry when people made fun of her size!

"I´m not a shrimp and it´s non of your business!" She huffed, not able to cross her arms with the drink still in her hand.

"Aw, don´t get yer panties in a twist, shorty. I was just asking, since ya could get crushed in here all alone and we don´t want that, do we?" He said, mockingly and patted her head, successfully messing up her hair and getting some strands of her hair out of her headband, annoying her even more. Although the idea of the possibility of him caring for her safety was slightly flattering, a thought she dismissed as soon as it came.

"I will have you know that I can take care of myself just fine and who said that I´m alone?! I´m here with a friend." She said, swatting his hand away and trying to proceed her way to a frowning Lucy, who looked interested at her and the guy she was talking to. To her utter surprise she felt him grip her wrist before she was too far away from him, making her whip her head back to look at him. She was startled by the more serious look on his face, when he looked back at her with a frown.

"Being here with another chick will not protect you enough when the brawls start, shorty and I can tell you that those are not the harmless type of bar fights in here!" He said in all seriousness, which startled her. She recovered quickly from her shock, put on a frown of her own on her face and walked closer to him and rose as far as she could on her toes to be nearly face to face with him to make her point clear.

"Brute force is not the only thing that can protect someone! You need the smarts to survive!" She said, taking him by surprise which was visible by the small step he took away from her and wide eyes, which changed into a wide grin, shoving off his rather sharp canines. If it wasn´t for him acting like an arrogant ass she would have thought of it as sexy.

"Good point, shrimp, but if ya need any brute force to your 'smarts' you can come to me, gihi" He said, smirking in his arrogant way.

They both realized that he was still holding her wrist which he let go of as if it was a hot stone, making both of the blush and look away for a moment.

"W-well, I´m going back to my friend then. I´ve kept her waiting long enough." She said, receiving only a nod from the man before she walked away.

When she sat at their table she was not happy to see the cheeky smirk on her friends face.

"DON´T even start!" She warned, which went through deaf ears.

"Ne, Levy-chan~ who was that guy, huh? Your conversation looked pretty interesting from here." She purred.

"Exactly! It only looked interesting from here!" She said pointing to the table and then getting back to her not-as-full-as-before drink.

"Oh, COME ON, Levy-chan! You should make some risks in your life! And he looked pretty interested in you, especially that sudden grip at your wrist indicated that he didn´t want your conversation to end so soon ~" She said, still smiling brightly and having that spark in her eyes which normally only their friend Juvia had when she was swooning over her boyfriend.

Levy only gave out a short, humorless laugh " Yeah, he probably sees me as a kid, since he was so worried about me getting hurt in here." She muttered into her drink, not meeting Lucy´s disapproving gaze.

"That´s nonsense, Levy and you know that! Just talk to him and see what happens!"

"But we came her to have a GIRLS NIGHT and not a LETS GET LEVY A BOYFRIEND NIGHT!" She said, frowning.

"That would be the best gift you could make me for celebrating my new novel!" She said with a kind smile, winking at her friend.

After Levy told Lucy what Her and the guy were talking about their conversation was cut off by loud cheers coming from the arm-wrestling table. Lucy looked over and then smiled brightly at Levy.

"What?" She said, suspiciously.

"Your friend is showing off his 'brute force'" She said, nodding behind her.

She turned around and saw that the man she was talking with earlier was arm wrestling with another guy, who had a strange haircut, dyed black and blue. She couldn´t hear what they were saying but the guy with the strange hairstyle started laughing, sticking his tongue out, which was, to Levy´s horror, tattooed.

Many people were standing around them and cheering, a girl whit short white hair was standing beside the guy and cheering him on more enthusiastic than the others.

 _\- Is she that strange guys girlfriend?!-_ Levy wondered, finding the big difference between this possible pair kind of cute. Then realization hit her and she recognized the girl.

"Wait, isn´t that Lisanna?!" Levy asked out loud, making Lucy look in the direction Levy was looking.

"Oh yes! Now that you say it, the guy wrestling with your friend is Bickslow, her boyfriend!" Lucy said.

"Would you stop calling him my friend!?" Levy said, huffing.

"Would you rather want me to call him your boyfriend?" Lucy asked, feigning innocence, until a large smile spread over her face when Levy scowled at her.

"You know that I will continue this until you ask him out." Lucy said matter-of-factly and Levy knew that she was not lying.

"W-WHAT! Why do I have to ask HIM out?!" Levy stuttered, blushing madly.

"Because he does not look like the guy who would and he did the first move by talking to you! Oh,oh! Maybe he even bumped into you on purpose!" Lucy exclaimed, happy with her realization.

"You´re definitely overthinking it and I´m not going to lend you any of my romance novels anymore and we are definitely not living in one of yours!" She said, shaking her head.

They heard the loud cheers and saw that Bickslow lost, getting comforted by Lisanna and gave his seat to the next challenger, who happened to be two guys, one with orange hair which was tied in a ponytail and the other with black hair, who was chubby; who her 'friend' had apparently challenged to take on at the same time and to everyone´s astonishment he won without much effort even mocking them by feigning to yawn.

"Just go talk to him! What do you have to lose? Live wild!" Lucy cheered her on.

Levy didn´t know if it was the alcohol in her drink, but she was getting more encouraged to go over to him.

And someone HAD to get rid of that overly cocky smirk of his.

"You know what Lu-chan? Maybe you are right!" Levy said, hearing Lucy chock on her drink because of her declaration and look at her with her bewilder look.

"Really now?!" She asked, not believing her ears.

"Yes!" Levy said, stood up and walked over to the table.

To her surprise the crowd made room for her and she walked over to one of the empty seats after the two last challengers left the table.

She could here the crowd murmuring in the back, some surprised and some finding the situation really fun, which annoyed her greatly.

When her person of interest looked back over to the seat before him, he looked wide eyed at her. To say that he was surprised would be the understatement of the year, but he covered his surprise quickly with a smirk.

"What´s that, shrimp? Coming over ta chat?" He said, chuckling.

"Oh, no … not really. Just here to prove my point about the might of smarts!" She said and propped her elbow on the table, hearing 'aaah's and 'oooh's from the crowd around them.

He looked startled, but took her hand anyway, with a shake of his head and an amused smirk.

"I don´t want ta break yer little arm, shorty!" He warned.

"Don´t worry! That won´t happen." She said, giving him her own cocky smirk, making the man´s heart flutter, not that he would ever admit that to anyone.

When he was about to put pressure on her hand, she started to rise from her seat and leaned forward. He was about to protest when he felt her lips press hard against his own. In the short moment that the kiss lasted he had forgotten how to breath and his brain stopped functioning until he felt her slam his hand unto the table and pull away from him. He could hear the cheers from the crowd but could only look at the girl before him with wide eyes and after a moment he could only laugh which then turned into full out laugh.

"Gihahaha, not bad, shrimp! Ya definitely proved yer point!" He said, a light red blush on his cheeks, which was also present on Levy´s.

He then reached out his hand towards her, which she gladly took.

"Name's Gajeel, Gajeel Redfox" He introduced himself, still smirking.

"Levy, Levy Mcgarden" She replied, giving him the brightest smile he had ever seen. He didn´t let go of her hand immediately and instead leaned closer to her.

"Wanna join me for a drink?" He asked her.

"Uh … well .." She hesitated and looked over to Lucy, who had suddenly vanished from her seat. She didn´t know if she should be thankful or angry about this, but she choose the first.

She turned back to Gajeel and smiled. "Sure, as long as you don´t spill my drink again." She joked.

"Won´t make any promises, shorty, but at least now ya have the brawls to yer brains to be completely safe, don´t ya!?" He said, helping her up from her seat and walking together towards the bar.

 _Maybe a man was not such a bad thing in her life, after all.~_

 _End_

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 **A/N**

 **Hope ya liked it :)**

 **AND PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW FOR ME! and tell me if there are any mistakes :D**


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